SAP SE has unveiled SAP Business Data Cloud, a new solution designed to unify all SAP and third-party data across an organisation. This platform provides a reliable data foundation to improve decision-making and enhance artificial intelligence (AI) applications. By integrating data from critical business applications with advanced analytics and data engineering capabilities, SAP aims to unlock new levels of innovation and insight.
The launch marks a significant collaboration between SAP and Databricks, two major players in enterprise software and data management. The partnership ensures seamless integration of Databricks’ data engineering, machine learning, and AI capabilities into SAP’s ecosystem.
“SAP Business Data Cloud unleashes the full value of enterprise data for Business AI,” said SAP CEO Christian Klein. “It combines SAP’s unique expertise in mission-critical, end-to-end processes and semantically rich data with Databricks’ world-class data engineering capabilities to create a ground-breaking solution that helps organisations do more with their data than ever before.”
Ali Ghodsi, Co-founder and CEO of Databricks, emphasised the benefits of this collaboration. “Every company on the planet wants to get more value out of their data and greater returns on their AI investments. By joining forces with SAP, we’re helping organisations bring together all their data—regardless of format or where it lives—to govern, analyse, and build domain-specific AI applications on the Databricks Data Intelligence Platform.”
Expanding the data product economy
SAP Business Data Cloud introduces a shift towards a data product economy by offering fully managed SAP data products across various business functions. These include finance, supply chain, procurement, and human resources data from SAP platforms such as SAP S/4HANA, SAP Ariba, and SAP SuccessFactors. The platform ensures that data maintains its original business context and semantics, allowing organisations to access high-quality insights without the need for complex extraction processes.
For instance, a Chief Financial Officer (CFO) looking to assess the impact of inflation on profitability can leverage SAP Business Data Cloud to integrate real-time external data, such as consumer price indices, with financial data products like general ledger accounts and cost centres. This provides a more comprehensive and timely financial overview.
The solution also introduces “insight apps,” which utilise data products and AI models connected to real-time data. These apps will enhance analytics and planning across various business units, including enterprise analytics, finance, and human resources.
Markus Hartmann, Corporate Vice President and Head of Business Technology at Henkel, a global chemical and consumer goods company, praised the new platform. “SAP Business Data Cloud will help us unlock the value of our data and drive innovation across our business. Its semantically rich data products and deep Databricks integration will enhance our existing data products and empower us to model scenarios and leverage AI insights, building a sustainable future for our data ecosystems.”
Advancing AI-driven automation with Joule agents
SAP Business Data Cloud is set to enhance Joule, SAP’s generative AI copilot, by streamlining cross-functional workflows and improving decision-making through AI-powered automation. The platform benefits from SAP’s extensive enterprise datasets and the SAP Knowledge Graph, which structures data in a business-friendly format.
In line with this, SAP introduced a range of pre-built Joule AI agents tailored for finance, customer service, and sales. These agents aim to optimise operations, such as processing claims more efficiently in finance or handling customer inquiries more swiftly in sales.
Additionally, SAP announced a new agent builder feature, allowing businesses to create and deploy their own AI agents. By leveraging SAP’s deep expertise in business processes, this tool enables organisations to customise AI-driven workflows to suit their specific needs.
With this launch, SAP is positioning itself at the forefront of enterprise AI and data integration, enabling businesses to maximise the potential of their data while improving efficiency and decision-making.
